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Next meeting will be October 12th, 2008

Rendezvous with Rama

Author: Arthur C. Clarke

The HSGP Book Club meets at the Mesa Library, Main Branch, 64 East 1st Street (East of Country Club Way at the intersection of N. Centennial Way -- N.W. corner)

From Amazon.com:

An all-time science fiction classic, Rendezvous with Rama is also one of Clarke's best novels--it won the Campbell, Hugo, Jupiter, and Nebula Awards. A huge, mysterious, cylindrical object appears in space, swooping in toward the sun. The citizens of the solar system send a ship to investigate before the enigmatic craft, called Rama, disappears. The astronauts given the task of exploring the hollow cylindrical ship are able to decipher some, but definitely not all, of the extraterrestrial vehicle's puzzles. From the ubiquitous trilateral symmetry of its structures to its cylindrical sea and machine-island, Rama's secrets are strange evidence of an advanced civilization. But who, and where, are the Ramans, and what do they want with humans? Perhaps the answer lies with the busily working biots, or the sealed-off buildings, or the inaccessible "southern" half of the enormous cylinder. Rama's unsolved mysteries are tantalizing indeed. Rendezvous with Rama is fast moving, fascinating, and a must-read for science fiction fans. Clarke collaborated with Gentry Lee in writing several Rama sequels, beginning with Rama II.


Past Selections
09/14/08
The Periodic Table
Author: Primo Levi

08/17/08
Break, Blow, Burn
Author: Camille Paglia

07/20/08
The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection
Author: Charles Darwin

06/08/08
The Memory Keeper's Daughter
Author: Kim Edwards

05/11/08
On the Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God
Author: Carl Sagan

04/13/08
Persepolis
Author: Marjane Satrapi

03/23/08
The Uncommon Reader
Author: Alan Bennett

02/03/08
Atlas Shrugged
Author: Ayn Rand

01/13/08
The World Without Us
Author: Alan Weisman

11/11/07
Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know
Author: E. D. Hirsch Jr

10/14/07
While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam Is Destroying the West from Within
Author: Bruce Bawer

09/16/07
God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything
Author: Christopher Hitchens

08/19/07
Three Cups of Tea
Author: Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin

07/15/07
Adam's Curse: The Science That Reveals Our Genetic Destiny
Author: Bryan Sykes

06/10/07
Suite Francaise
Author: Irčne Némirovsky

05/13/07
Confessions of an Economic Hit Man
Author: John Perkins

04/08/07
Crimes Against Logic
Author: Jamie Whyte

03/11/07
John Adams
Author: David McCullough

02/11/07
Innumeracy: Mathematical Illiteracy and Its Consequences
Author: John Allen Paulos

01/14/07
Wake-Up Call: The Political Education of a 9/11 Widow
Author: Kristen Breitweiser

11/12/06
The Lucifer Principle: A Scientific Expedition into the Forces of History
Author: Howard Bloom

10/15/06
Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking
Author: Malcolm Gladwell

09/17/06
American Theocracy
Author: Kevin Phillips

08/13/06
Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your History Textbook Got Wrong
Author: James W. Loewen

07/16/06
The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century
Author: Thomas Friedman

06/11/06
Ingersoll the Magnificent
Author: Joseph Lewis

05/21/06
Ecotopia
Author: Ernest Callenbach

04/16/06
The Iron Heel
Author: Jack London

03/26/06
State of War
Author: James Risen

02/12/06
A Man Without a Country
Author: Kurt Vonnegut

01/15/06
Guns, Germs and Steel
Author: Jared Diamond

11/27/05
Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism
Author: Susan Jacoby

10/23/05
The Truth About Jesus: Is He a Myth?
Author: Mangasar Magurditch Mangasarian

09/18/05
Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman: Adventures of a Curious Character
Author: Richard P. Feynman

08/28/05
The Plot Against America
Author: Philip Roth

07/17/05
America Declares Independence
Author: Alan Dershowitz

06/18/05
In the Land of Second Chances
Author: George Shaffner

05/29/05
The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason
Author: Sam Harris

04/24/05
Humanism as the Next Step
Author: Lloyd and Mary Morain

03/27/05
Slant
Author: Greg Bear

02/27/05
Enough: Staying Human in an Engineered Age
Author: Bill McKibben

01/16/05
The Kite Runner
Author: Khaled Hosseini

11/28/04
I'm a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After 20 Years Away
Author: Bill Bryson

10/17/04
The Moral Animal, Why We Are the Way We Are: The New Science of Evolutionary Psychology
Author: Robert Wright

08/29/04
Life of Pi: A Novel
Author: Yann Martel

06/20/04
REASON Magazine
Author: Nick Gillespie, Editor-in-Chief

05/23/04
Angels & Demons
Author: Dan Brown

04/11/04
Reading Lolita in Tehran
Author: Azar Nafisi

03/14/04
Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith
Author: Jon Krakauer

02/15/04
The Bubble of American Supremacy
Author: George Soros

01/18/04
The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
Author: Carl Sagan